boy, I won't sentimentalise; but that's the truth; I shall wake up
to-morrow and for many days, feeling that some good fortune has
befallen me; but we should have found each other some time, even if
I had been a poor and miserable old woman. You have given me all
that I desired; give me a daughter too, if you can!"

"Well," said Howard, smiling, "I have no theory on the subject. I
never regarded marriage as either impossible or possible. It seemed
to me that one was either caught away in a fiery chariot, or else
was left under one's juniper tree; and I have been very comfortable
there. I thought I had all I wanted; and I feel a little dizzy now
at the way in which my cup of life has suddenly been seized and
filled with wine to the brim. One doesn't find a home and a mother
and a wife in a fortnight!"

"I don't know!" said Mrs. Graves, smiling at him. "Some of the best
marriages I know have been made in haste. I remember talking to a
girl the other day who was engaged to a man within ten days of the
time they had met. I said, 'Well, you have not wasted time.' 'Oh,'
she said, apparently rather hurt, 'I kept Henry waiting a long
time. I had to think it all over. I wasn't by any means sure I
wanted to marry him.' I quoted a saying of an old friend of mine
who when he was asked why he had proposed to a girl he had only
known three days, said, 'I don't know! I liked her, and thought I
should like to see more of her!'"

"I think I must make out a list of possible candidates," said
Howard, smiling. "I dare say your Jane would help me. I could mark
them for various qualities; we believe in marks at Cambridge. But I
must have time to get used to all my new gifts."